Edward Torsney

The UK government has unveiled a grotesque display of twisted priorities, shamelessly announcing a surge in military spending—including a staggering £3 billion per year to fuel the deadly machinery of Ukraine’s war effort—while simultaneously condemning schools to devastating funding cuts. This callous betrayal of future generations exposes a regime more invested in prolonging foreign conflict than nurturing its own children.

According to the National Education Union (NEU), a staggering 94% of schools in England will face real-terms budget cuts next year, with losses averaging £100,000 per primary school and a jaw-dropping £400,000 per secondary school. Classrooms are crumbling, teacher shortages are exploding, and vulnerable students are being abandoned—all while Downing Street gleefully writes blank cheques for missiles and tanks.

This is an unforgivable moral failure. How dare this government claim it “values education” while slashing £1.5 billion from school budgets in 2024 alone? How dare it lecture families about “fiscal responsibility” as it squanders £3 billion annually on a war with no endgame—a conflict that has already claimed hundreds of thousands of lives and destabilised Europe?

The NEU’s damning analysis reveals the human cost: schools forced to axe mental health support, special needs provisions, and even basic classroom supplies. Meanwhile, billions vanish into a militaristic black hole, subsidising destruction abroad as our children’s futures are vandalised at home.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s regime has the audacity to frame this warmongering as “global leadership”. In reality, it’s a cowardly distraction from domestic collapse—a desperate bid to posture as a geopolitical player while classrooms overcrowd, teachers burn out, and students suffer.

This isn’t “defence.” It’s delusion. Labour would rather bankroll death and destruction than invest in living, breathing children. They’d rather arm a foreign war than fund textbooks, counsellors, or heating for freezing school buildings.

Shame on this government. Shame on every minister who votes to starve schools while stuffing the pockets of arms dealers. The public sees this cruelty for what it is: a grotesque abdication of duty to the young, the vulnerable, and the very idea of a just society.

Our children deserve better than bullets. They deserve books. They deserve a future.